BASEBALL

BASEBALL; Now It's Sandberg Playing Money Game

By MURRAY CHASS, Special to The New York Times

Published: February 27, 1991

MESA, Ariz., Feb. 26—
The Chicago Cubs, whose uncharacteristic off-season expenditures have elevated them to the contending status of the Mets, have also, like the Mets, developed a contract-extension problem with one of their star players.

Ryne Sandberg's agent, Jim Turner, returned home to St. Louis today after failing Monday to resolve their differences with the Cubs.

"It's not a good sign, not at this point," Sandberg said, waiting to take his turn in the batting cage at the Cubs' camp three days before he is scheduled to begin working out. "They're using Gwynn; we're using Canseco." Reflection of Escalation

Translation: The Cubs are offering the kind of extension the San Diego Padres recently gave Tony Gwynn, $12.25 million for three years, an average of $4,083,333 a year, but Sandberg thinks the numbers in the last three years of Jose Canseco's $23.5 million contract, an average of $5.23 million a year, would come closer to an appropriate package.

The talks between the Cubs and their perennial All-Star second baseman epitomize one of the developments created by the winter escalation in player salaries. Star-level players with existing but suddenly economically outdated contracts and their clubs are debating extensions that would boost the players onto the plateau of baseball's nouveau riche.

Some players, such as the Mets' Dwight Gooden, shoot for extensions with one year left on their contracts. Others, such as Sandberg and Gwynn, negotiate when they have two more years. Distraction to Be Avoided

"It all goes back to the fact that they came to us a few times during the season last year and wanted to do something," Sandberg said, explaining the derivation of the current talks. "We're just following up on that."

In the case of both the Mets and the Cubs, the talks threaten to create more animosity and greater distraction than anyone really wants entering a season when the teams are expected to compete with each other for a division championship.

Long-Range Plans

Sandberg himself has dabbled in deadline talk.

"I'm being advised by my people that if it gets down to one year I'd be better off to take it all the way to free agency," he said today. He also said he did not want to negotiate past Friday because he didn't want the talks to distract him during the season.

In other words, if the Cubs don't agree on an extension by Friday, Sandberg would proceed with long-range plans to become a free agent after the 1992 season because he wouldn't talk about a contract during the season and once they reach the end of the 1991 season, he would be "down to one year." So it goes when players or their agents set deadlines and threaten long-range free agency. Frey Isn't Worried Now

"I'm not going to worry about deadlines right now," Jim Frey, the Cubs' general manager, said. "We're working on it."

Including the option for next year, which the Cubs will certainly exercise, Sandberg is in the middle year of a three-year, $6.3 million contract. He signed it in April 1989, when he was beginning the last year of a six-year package that made him grossly underpaid at a total of $3.97 million. Like Gwynn, he always has lagged behind the top money-makers.

"That has nothing to do with anything," Sandberg said of the six-year contract he signed in February 1984. "I've been happy. I had security, which is what I wanted." Extensions for Gwynn

Gwynn, San Diego's star right fielder, fell behind as soon as he signed a six-year contract in November 1984, for $4.5 million. The Padres subsquently amended the contract in March 1987, adding award bonuses; ammended it again in February 1988, giving him an additional $500,000; gave him a two-year extension in December 1988, for $4,325,000, and then last Friday gave him another extension, this one for three years and $12.25 million.

It is the most recent extension that Sandberg said the Cubs were using in their negotiations with him. But Sandberg, who last season batted .306, hit 40 home runs and drove in 100 runs, wants to be paid like Canseco.

"I told them all along I don't want this to drag into spring training and the season," Sandberg said. "I don't want it to be a distraction. It's not going to be. But that's why we're trying to get it done by Friday. If it's not, I have two years left. I won't worry about it."

Photo: Cubs' Ryne Sandberg fielding a ground ball yesterday at the Cubs' camp in Mesa, Ariz. Sandberg is in the middle year of a three-year, $6.3 million contract, but thinks the contract is economically outdated. With two years left in his contract, Sandberg wants to negotiate. (Associated Press)